Queenie Hetherton
9781465679123
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Arthur Beresford’s face was a puzzle as he read this letter from one whose business agent and lawyer he merely was, and whom he scarcely remembered at all except as a dashing, handsome young man, whom everybody called fast, and whom some called a scamp. “Cool, upon my word!” he thought, as he folded the letter and returned it to his pocket. “A nice little job he has given me to do. Clean the house; air Miss Reinette’s bed-chamber; move the old worm-eaten furniture, and substitute something light and cheerful which Reinette will like; put muslin curtains to her windows; get up a lot of horses for her inspection; fill the garden with flowers, where there’s nothing but nettles and weeds growing now; and, to crown all, hunt up a menagerie of dogs and cats, when, if there is one animal more than another of which I have a mortal terror, it is a cat. And this Reinette is passionately fond of them. Who is she, any way? I never heard before that Mr. Hetherton had a daughter; neither, I am sure, did the Rossiters or Fergusons. Mrs. Peggy would be ready enough to talk of her Paris granddaughter if she had one. But we shall see. Mr. Hetherton’s letter has been delayed. He sails the 25th. That is day after to-morrow, so I have no time to lose, if I get everything done, cats and all. I wish he had given the job to somebody else. Phil Rossiter, now, is just the chap to see it through. He’d know exactly how to loop the curtains back, while as for cats I have actually seen the fellow fondling one in his arms. Ugh!” and the young lawyer made an impatient gesture with his hands, as if shaking off an imaginary cat. Just at this point in his soliloquy, Colonel Rossiter, who had been leisurely reading his two letters inside the office, came out, and remembering that he was a connection by marriage with the Hethertons, Mr. Beresford detained him for a moment by laying a hand on his arm, and thus making him stand still while he read the letter to him, and asked what he thought of it. “Think?” returned the colonel, trying to get away from his companion, “I don’t think anything; I’m in too great a hurry to think—a very great hurry, Mr. Beresford, and you must excuse me from taking an active part in anything. I really have not the time. Fred. Hetherton has a right to come home if he wants to—a perfect right. I never liked him much—a stuck-up chap, who thought the Lord made the world for the special use of the Hethertons, and not a Rossiter in it. No, no; I’m in too great a hurry to think whether I ever heard of a daughter or not—impression that I didn’t; but he might have forty, you know. Go to the Fergusons; they are sure to be posted, and so is Phil, my son. By the way, he’s coming home on next train. Consult him; he’s just the one, he’s nothing else to do, more’s the pity. And, now, really, Mr. Beresford, you must let me go. I’ve spent a most uncommon length of time talking with you and I bid you good-morning.”
